[Loraine]

Welcome to the TAC community!

What you’ve outlined is completely normal. I had never had any experience with the guitar until I started with TAC, and I found it extremely challenging at the beginning. You’ve gotten some great advice from others.

What I would like to add is that if something isn’t challenging then you won’t get better. If it’s too easy then it doesn’t give you something to work towards. Guitar is a difficult instrument, or a challenging instrument, but you can learn to play the guitar. It takes time. It takes patience. It takes effort at the beginning. It seems daunting and frustrating.

But I always tell people don’t give up until the miracle happens. That miracle may take a while to happen. I almost quit at the end of two years because I was frustrated. I could play. I could play some songs at that point, but I felt things were very challenging still, and I felt others were leaps and bounds ahead of me. I was actually going to meet a few TAC members for a three day jam, and I knew I was out of my league. I got a list of the songs that were suggested, and I practiced as many as I could over and over and over and nowhere near perfect. The jam wasn’t great, and I left early. But when I got back from it, something clicked and all of a sudden I just took off in my playing, in my learning and it’s still like that a few years later, I’m not a great player and I’m OK with that, but I can play a lot of songs. I play for the sheer enjoyment for myself. It’s my happy place.. That’s my motivator. You need to find what motivates you and you have to remind yourself often, while you’re playing and then you have to just put 1 foot in front of the other and eventually all of a sudden it just takes off.

[Loraine]

Welcome to TAC Zia!

It can be difficult and daunting when first learning. I knew absolutely nothing about the guitar when I started, so I completely understand the confusion and feeling overwhelmed and trying to understand everything. Guitar is not necessarily the easiest instrument, but it does get easier with time.

If you ever get a chance to take Fretboard wizard, I highly recommend it to understand a lot of what Albert was explaining with regard to the make up of a chord and the root notes.

As for an A chord, the note is the a string so you strap from the a down, which would be strumming 54321 if you’re counting the strings, the D chords route note is the D string, so Tony is strumming from the D down 4321 eventually, it just becomes second nature to know what strings to strum and to also have string awareness and to build up muscle memory in your fingers to know exactly how to fret a chord and also the strings too strum .

My suggestion to anyone starting out is to be patient to be kind and to know that it will take time, but you will .

[Loraine]

Hey Brian, welcome to the TAC community!

It’s a legit and good question TAC teaches progress rather than perfection. It’s OK that you don’t master any of the lessons or skills as you’re going through the 30 days to play or even once you start taking the daily challenges.

Tony researched it quite a bit when he was developing the program and the backbone is that if you can put in a minimum of 10 minutes per day, you will progress . So it’s suggested that you put in the minimum of 10 minutes and Mark a lesson complete that doesn’t mean you can’t continue to practice that lesson. It just means that you shouldn’t be bound by it and trying to reach perfection. It’s actually counterproductive if you practice something too much.

So you’ve put in seven days, so the questions are, Do you have more knowledge than you did seven days ago, and have you progressed and you’re playing capability during those seven days? If the answer is yes, then you were doing everything perfectly and just continue to do that and to move forward. Don’t get caught up on the perfection. Keep moving forward. What you will find is that once you get into the daily challenges, they have quarterly check-ins, which are basically working on a group of lessons that you’ve already taken in the past and taking notes of how much you’ve improved since the last time you took that particular weeks worth of lessons. During those weeks, it is recommended or suggested that you actually tape each of your lessons, so that you have a reference point to go back to and compare how much you’ve improved or things that come easier.

[Loraine]

Sometimes it happens because there is a need to clear your cache.

[Loraine]

Hey Cami, just by going tgrough the lessons, continuing to take baby steps and put one foot in front of the other

And continuing to quit moved forward by picking up your guitar every single day are all small wins. They all contribute to your success down the road.

Congrats on a great win!!

[Loraine]

Hi Dave

The purpose is to treat it just as you would any other lesson, but the benchmark aspect of it means that you will use this week as a benchmark to how you are doing when we go through the song again. You’ll be able to see your improvement . So that’s why it’s called a benchmark.

I suggest that you maybe record your practice each day and just say that.And then the next time you go through it, you can compare the different timestamps.

[Loraine]

Woohoo!! CONGRATS RODNEY! I remember when you started, and yes, time goes by so quickly. Congrats, and I look forward to y

[Loraine]

Hi Cami! Welcome to the TAC family!

Acoustic is more difficult.l to play than electric. There’s no reason why you cant practice.on your electric. I like your routine of trying first on the acoustic, and then you switch to electric.

The classical/nylon is another great suggestion, but you have 2 guitars that are great tools to learn on. Keep trying on the acoustic, but absolutely go to the electric for practicing. My old guitar teacher had me use the electric for practice between lessons. I was able to build up skills, feel confident, and eventually able to play mostly acoustic.

[Loraine]

Brandon this is actually one of the best questions I’ve seen posted. I remember when I first started learning guitar during Covid, and I thought I’ll be playing the guitar and all the songs that I love within a few months. That obviously did not happen for me.

I’ve seen people come here and have picked up on it fairly quickly I could name names but I won’t add to any stigmas out there about them picking up so quickly. Players come from all different backgrounds? Many had played back when they were younger or still played and they wanted to move to the next level. There are many who had experience with Music in different aspects, different musical instruments and they wanted to then move onto the guitar. I see this a lot with people that played electric guitar for a long time and now they were transitioning to acoustic. FYI, electric relies more on power chords and rarely any barre chords or chords at all. The acoustic is much more difficult than learning the electric, in my opinion.There are some people that just have a natural ability, and they’re able to literally just pick up and take off you know in their playing. There are those that have vast experience but they’ve gotten older and they have arthritis or physical disabilities many other things and they’re learning new ways of being able to continue down the road they’ve always loved.

I don’t need to tell you that guitar is a difficult instrument to learn. There are many of us that don’t fit in the above buckets. I for one had played piano as a child but I had no natural ability and it showed it in my playing. It also didn’t help that I did not practice much except when I was angry that was my go to. I tried to play violin when I was in grade school. I spent more time facing the wall and counting the holes in the cement.

So I really didn’t have any experience and I didn’t even know anything about the guitar at all. I called the strings keys because I had only played piano for that short time. Because I have no natural ability, it takes me much longer to learn than other people I would say that after however, many years I’ve been here, I’m still not a great player. I’m not beginner I’m probably intermediate but at the lower end of the spectrum. But I absolutely love playing the guitar, and I think that’s all that really matters to me. It is an outlet for me. I love the sound of the acoustic. It is a go to of mine because I live alone so it’s companionship for me. I go to it when I’m sad, angry, happy. I have a new group of friends, and some are very special and dear to me and I am grateful that I’ve met them. I have great mentors since I’ve begun here and I talk to them about things.

I think it was beginning of my third year of playing I had almost quit at the end of my second year out of frustration. I was going to meet people in person and there was a list of songs and I wanted to be able to participate and have a good time and I spent a lot of time practicing those songs and something just clicked after I returned. I don’t know what it was but all of a sudden I was able to start playing a lot of songs, and it just took off. I literally was learning a few songs a week. My court transitions got much better, my strumming loosened up strumming loosened up.

Prior to that I was playing songs I was a guitar player I was probably still ahead of the curves of what a normal person would be at two years into their playing . I actually began lessons locally while I was still utilizing TAC. The guitar teacher was shocked at the level of playing, knowledge and skills that I had at that point. The daily challenges really did give me a lot of knowledge about different aspects of playing and prep board wizard taught me quite a bit about what chords are made of what notes the difference shapes under the caged system it taught me how to find the notes of a song so I could tell what key it was in, the notes in the different scales of a key, especially after taking fretboard wizard. He was extremely encouraging for me to continue with TAC, and he often would supplement the lessons at TAC and we would work on things together. He was never threatened by my being committed to TAC. I highly suggest something similar for anyone who is questioning whether they should be further along. 1. Find a jam club. Find other guitar players to play with. You will be amazed at how your Learning and playing just takeoff and it’s a lot of fun too. There’s a lot of different ways to find other people look at meet up.com or you could look at music shops a lot of times they have boards of people looking for the same thing you could look here under members and find some that are local to you and reach out to them

As usual, my post is too long but I just felt like this was such a good question Brandon I don’t know why you asked it, except maybe you’re feeling frustrated or questioning the program or your capabilities. Whatever it is, I always tell people don’t leave before the magic happens, and the magic does happen at some point, and then it just takes off and you’re trying to keep up with it and enjoying the journey completely.

[Loraine]

You amaze me oicking up on things so quickly, and you’re not afraid to try something. You did beautifully in both songs. I’m envious of your voice. I have atrophied voca,l chords that I’ve been trying to exercise, I had a lower voice, but it’s really bad now because I had a rather extensive sinus surgery years back to not only fix a deviated septum, but my sinuses collapsed, and each nostril flattened or closed . Basically I couldn’t breathe. They were gonna use cartlidge from my ears to build the support for my nose and to pull the nostrils open. They ended up shaving part of the septum and using that instead. I used to actually sing very well it was soprano when I was young and my voice just keeps getting lower and lower and lower I have problems with a lot of allergies, asthma and sinus issues, and I have large mass and several nodules in my lungs and some cysts so it affects my breathing when I’m trying to sing. So all of it just basically totally screwed up my talking my singing everything I’m just envious of your beautiful voice and as usual I apologize for my long post ha ha

[Loraine]

I can’t even compete or expound upon what you’ve just outlined. I’m a sporadic daily person. I get up every day saying you’re gonna do the daily and it really happens. I do pick up the guitar every day, but I really should get back to the daily lessons and I took lessons from a local instructor years ago, and I was with TAC then, he commented that he was very surprised at how advanced I was for having picked up. The guitar may be a year earlier or whatever and he never challenged me or put downTAC and any manner in fact, he often wanted to know what I was working on that week and we would play around with it then that was fun. It really was and I haven’t done it in a long time and I probably should. I’m just not an improv player. I was a faithful daily challenge player, and I’m not sure when it stopped being daily probably at undo with some medical issues or just work issues that got in the way.

[Loraine]

Dang, look at you racking out! Great string, hand and string coordination of memory. You did great with speed, and it was obvious you enjoyed it. Rock on!

[Loraine]

Hi. Barbara. It’s definitely been a challenge. I’ve actually. had worse pain after the 3rd surgery . I mean debilitating pain anad throbbing, nerve pain and hypersensitivity. and the. arthritis in my thumb and fingers is amplified. I do believe a lot of it is duee to a very wet. and. cold winter.

But, I’m still playing every day, but I just can’t. play as long, and I’m back to playing barre. chords like I was previously. I can really feel the pain and stiffness when I first start playing, but I won’t notice it as I get into playing. It’s when I stop and go to straighten my wrist and fingers out that the pain is excruciating, but I rest, rub topical pain relievers, and often times ice. Yet, there are other times, I can play for an hour or two and I’m just so into it, that I don’t notice the pain.

My surgeon is leaving his practice as of 1/14. He is around 50 and now has more money than he knows what to do with, and he’s going to Paris to get a doctorate in Philosophy. He wants to teach ethical practices in surgery (kinda scary they have to teach that). He says his collleague who I’m veing transferred to may show surprise at the wrist, but he’s hoping they read all his notes . When I broke my wrist, and with each surgery, I stressed how important playing guitar was to me and to please do his best to let me continue to play. He thinks my playing has been the best therapy for the hand. He said the type of breaks and amount of breaks typically end something like that.

[Loraine]

I really appreciate your message Jorge. It came at a time when I needed a little lifting. Thank you.

[Loraine]

Hi Pete, I still have quite a bit of pain. I got a steroid injection about a month ago. The doctor tried them twice before and they didn’t work. The pain was excruciating a month ago. This one actually helped. I see him tomorrow, and he’s giving me another. He’s leaving practice, and I’m heartbroken. I really liked him, and he took it very seriously when I said I had to be able to play.

He said whoever the new surgeon is that I see will probably be quite shocked at the condition of my wrist because it’s deformed from all the bones being shifted to the right from the force of the fall. He was hoping they would’ve fallen back into place naturally but that’s what’s causing the pain basically is my wrist and finger bones. All being shifted to the right and he said the only way to repair it was they have to cut out part of the bone and then they have to fuse the middle finger. I was horrified. I said I won’t be able to play guitar! And he said that’s why he never did the fourth surgery so now I have to see another surgeon. I’m afraid that he’s gonna push me to get the surgery.

I hadn’t seen my old guitar teacher for over a year. I contacted him to ask his assistance with something. He had never seen my wrist and was shocked that I could play after the large number of breaks, the deformity, the chronic pain. He was shocked I wouldn’t let them do the 4th surgery. I said you don’t understand, the guitar and TAC community saved my life. I’m not sure what I would do without it. It is a part of me now.

Anyway, @jorgemac I’ve very selfishly hijacked your post, and made it about me, I’m sooo sorry.